"Then I realized what a dream it was," she continued. "Music to you meant canon and fugue, counterpoint and diminished sevenths; to me it was the invitation to dance. You had no friends, and I was frightened by your willingness to be alone. You had nothing in common with me or my friends; you gave my heart nothing to feed upon except intellect—intellect, and I found myself one moment beneath its hypnotic influence, the next striving to break away from its oppression. Perhaps this was what you had in mind, Philip, that we two run off to some island such as this, to spend our lives in Utopia, alone except for ourselves and your books."
"For me, that would have been all I could have asked."
"But no one, Philip, can live on that alone. We need to draw from our companionship with others in order to give of it to each other. And you forget"—she smiled mischievously—"that when Aristotle begins to bore you he can be placed back upon the shelf. You couldn't do that with a wife! Admit, dear friend, that I or any other woman would have made you utterly wretched."
"I will admit that of any woman other than you."
They rose as by mutual impulse and strolled about the garden for several moments in silence, the thoughts of each centered upon the past.
"See this wild honey." Hamlen touched the curiously formed leaf. "It took me months to make it twine about that tree."
"How long would it have taken to make a baby's fingers twine about your heart?" Marian asked meaningly.
A twinge of pain shot across his face. "Have you—children?" he asked.
"Forgive me, Philip," she answered contritely. "Yes," in answer to his question; "a daughter, whom you shall meet at the hotel, and a big, strapping son. He's a senior at Harvard now, and his name is—Philip."
Hamlen suddenly seized her hand and pressed it to his lips. "Your husband won't begrudge me that," he said, with a quaver in his voice.